From Businessday.com.au: China Investment Corp (CIC), a $US300 billion ($327 billion) wealth fund, may be weighing up a bid for state-owned Chinalco’s stake in mining giant Rio Tinto, in what would be its boldest move yet into natural resources.

If CIC were to proceed, the fund would take a chunk of one of the world’s top diversified miners, delivering on Beijing’s goal to better use its huge foreign exchange reserves…………………………………….Full Article: Source

From Marketwatch.com: Aluminum Corp. of China, or Chinalco, is not considering selling its stake in mining giant Rio Tinto Ltd. to China’s sovereign wealth fund China Investment Corp. as has been reported, a person familiar with the situation said Friday.

Reuters has reported that CIC is weighing a bid for the 9.3% stake in the Rio Tinto group, held via a 12% stake in the London-listed stock of the dual listed company, which Chinalco acquired in 2008 when BHP Billiton Ltd. was making a takeover offer for its mining rival…………………………………….Full Article: Source

From WSJ: Export-Import Bank of China has signed a memorandum of understanding with several institutions, including China Investment Corp., to jointly launch a fund aimed at boosting trade and economic ties between China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, an official at China’s Ministry of Commerce said Friday.

The fund, in which International Finance Corp., the investment arm of the World Bank, will also invest, aims eventually to raise US$10 billion. It will have initial investment of $1 billion, the official, who declined to be named, told Dow Jones Newswires…………………………………….Full Article: Source

From Indiacorplaw: Nearly two years ago, there has been debates on the pros and cons of India’s establishment of a sovereign wealth fund (SWF), when that topic was the flavour of the day. Since then, the global financial crisis and receding stock markets at least partially eclipsed the increasing appeal of SWFs. Nevertheless they continue to capture the attention of regulators and commentators.

In a paper Sovereign Wealth - No Fund: The Decisive Role of Domestic Veto Players, Bernhard Reinsberg offers an explanation in political economy for the lack of an SWF in India…………………………………….Full Article: Source

From Gulf-times.com: The 2010 investment plan of Qatar Investment Authority, or QIA, includes looking for opportunities in the retail, commodities, and real estate sectors, a local Arabic newspaper reported yesterday.
QIA, the cuntry’s sovereign wealth fund, is currently studying some projects that are suffering from cash flow problems and that provide good investment opportunities…………………………………….Full Article: Source

From Thestar.com.my: Khazanah Nasional Bhd is believed to have obtained the nod from Bank Negara to negotiate for the sale of its 10% stake in EON Cap.

This makes Khazanah the third major shareholder to have received the nod to talk, after Rin Kei Mei and Tan Sri Tiong Hiew King, through their indirect 31.7% stake held through Kualapura Sdn Bhd and Lintang Emas Sdn Bhd (15.4%) and RH Development Sdn Bhd (16.3%)…………………………………….Full Article: Source

From Anchoragepress.com: When the question of whether to put the Permanent Fund—the money collected from oil and gas revenues and invested in stocks—into Alaska’s constitution was put to voters, the 1976 Election Pamphlet stated, “Today as the result of anticipated oil and gas revenues, Alaska stands on the brink of unprecedented prosperity.
No one, but no one, argues that these non-renewable resources will last but for a few decades. Similarly, no one should fail to recognize that in those years ahead the cost of state government will continue to spiral upwards…………………………………….Full Article: Source

From Reuters: Dubai World, the state- owned holding company seeking to restructure its debt, moved to quell speculation it could present its restructuring plans to creditors on Thursday, as reported by an Arabic-language newspaper.

“The story is erroneous. We are some time away from presenting a restructuring plan,” a spokesman said, adding that the next step in the discussions between the debt-laden company and its creditors would be to agree to a standstill…………………………………….Full Article: Source

From Polsoz.fu-berlin.de: Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWFs), government-owned investment funds, are of growing importance in international finance. They are a vehicle to manage foreign exchange reserves and wealth which have been accumulating in the emerging world, particularly in the BRICs.
However, while China and Russia set up SWFs over the last decade, India and Brazil still lack such funds. In analysing thoroughly the Indian case, this paper seeks to contribute to recent literature on the determinants of SWFs with two main findings:…………………………………….Full Article: Source

From Fool.com: China Investment Corp. came to Teck Resources’ rescue earlier this year with a $1.5 billion investment that gave the fund a 17% stake in the base-metal miner. It appears the deal was not even reviewed by the Investment Canada Act.
Contrast this, the largest ever investment by a Chinese entity in a Canadian company, with China Minmetals’ failed attempt a few years ago to take over mining giant Noranda (which soon merged with Falconbridge, and subsequently Xstrata)…………………………………….Full Article: Source

From Xinhua: Japan’s foreign reserves declined to 1,049.40 billion U.S. dollars at the end of December, down 24.32 billion U.S. dollars from a month earlier, the Ministry of Finance said on Friday.

According to the Finance Ministry, the reserves fell for the first time in six months on losses in the value of its holdings of U.S. treasury bonds and euro-denominated assets…………………………………….Full Article: Source

From Gmanews.tv: The country’s gross international reserves (GIR) rose to a record $45 billion at the end of last year mainly due to higher dollar inflows, foreign borrowings of the National Government and increasing value of the central bank’s gold holdings.

The year-end level was $800 million higher than the end-November level of $44.2 billion, and by $7.4 billion more than the end-2008 level of $37.6 billion, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) said in a statement of Thursday…………………………………….Full Article: Source